Between Trust and Reservations - How Close Do Consumers Let Temu, SHEIN and Co. Get to Them?
ECC CLUB Study 2026: Key Insights
What You Can Expect from the Study
Online retail is currently in one of its most exciting chapters: While established players such as Amazon and Otto continue to carry the trust of many consumers, new platforms such as Temu, SHEIN and Co. are entering the market with enormous speed, unprecedented pricing logic and radically data-driven business models.
The new ECC CLUB Study 2026 (German language) not only sheds light on key figures, but also provides a deep insight into the perceptions, contradictions and surprising, often dissonant behavioral patterns of consumers. This makes it clear that the relationship between consumers and platforms is far more than just a purchase decision: it is the negotiation of closeness and distance, trust and skepticism, convenience and control.
The study reveals how differently close consumers actually allow platforms such as Temu, SHEIN and Co. to get to them and shows where trust is created and where distance remains.
Platforms are "scalable by design" - every product, content and price decision is immediately measurable and customizable and systematically optimized for conversion and repurchase. Competition is therefore shifting from the "best store" to the best, machine-readable offer with the fastest learning curve - "best answer wins". For European retailers, this means that content, product data and customer data must be structured, flexibly orchestrated and AI-enabled in order to remain visible and relevant in this new logic.
Platforms such as TEMU and SHEIN will maintain their reach and market share and continue to expand in existing and new European markets despite growing regulatory intervention, with the lifting of the duty-free limit as an example. Speed and agile adaptability throughout the entire business model and the growing wealth of usage and purchase data are powerful tools against Western competitors and regulation. In view of the economic situation and politics, a mindset shift in customer purchasing behavior is currently not in sight.
Your Partner for Digital Commerce
Arvato Systems stands for innovative solutions in the field of digital commerce. With in-depth industry knowledge in retail and the consumer goods industry, we offer customized services that cover your entire process chain. From optimal master data and article management to customized e-commerce architectures and powerful customer loyalty systems - we offer holistic solutions for your digital success.
